If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You may have to register
before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

Far far away from the orgy that consist of clyde, 8's, rady, smokes and rono

Posts

11,260

Rep Power

0

Randolph for Lee...article from GSW writer

Famed journalist Eric Sevareid once observed that “the chief cause of problems is solutions.” With rumors swirling that the Warriors have a deal in place to send Anthony Randolph and possibly Ronny Turiaf, Kelenna Azubuike and/or Brandan Wright to New York for a signed-and-traded David Lee, the Warriors may have found a solution to their rebounding woes. The catch, however, lies in what other problems that solution may exacerbate.

The Marcus Thompson-reported rumor that triggered the latest round of Randolph-trade panic is short on specifics, and in a deal like this specifics matter. David Lee isn’t a bad player and, in the abstract, the thought of swapping a rough, unproven, skinny third-year power forward for a former All Star sounds like a no brainer. Lee has a bigger name and better stats than Randolph — and both advantages matter to a front office always looking to sell its moves to an increasingly skeptical public. For your fantasy team or for the poor guy writing Warriors’ press releases (you know, the guy who keeps misquoting Larry Riley), it’s an easily defensible move. But in the real world — in the context of the NBA’s worst defensive team — it’s a big mistake.

In no particular order, here’s why every justification for swapping Randolph for Lee falls apart on closer inspection:

Lee is a 20/10 guy — fans of Lee, like fans of Corey Maggette, always start with his stats. Both have spent their careers as good players on bad teams, so whatever their individual numbers, they haven’t translated to wins. Lee’s statistics give me particular pause since his two big years — 08-09 and 09-10 — were both contract years. For the two seasons before that, his numbers were 10/10 — essentially an Eastern Conference version of Andris Biedrins. As Erick Dampier repeatedly teaches teams, beware contract-year breakouts. But even assuming Lee’s numbers are legitimate, they’re no clear upgrade over Randolph. Equalizing at 40 minutes per game for last season, Lee averages 21.6 points, 12.6 rebounds, 3.9 assists, compared to Randolph’s 20.5 points, 11.5 rebounds and 2.2 assists. Given that Randolph is 7 years younger than Lee and hasn’t had a chance to play under a coach willing to use him in the same role for more than two games in a row, whatever slight advantage Lee has now statistically doesn’t justify the trade for me — particularly when you consider that the Warriors will be adding at least one other productive rotation player (Turiaf, Azubuike, Wright).

Lee is a great rebounder — No doubt, but so is Anthony Randolph. Lee has a slight advantage both in rebounds per minute (.314 vs. .286) and rebounding percentage (17.9% vs. 16.0% — the percentage of available rebounds the player grabs when on the floor). The numbers get even closer when you consider Randolph’s rookie numbers — a relatively healthy campaign — with Lee’s most recent year (.324 vs. .314. and 17.5% vs. 17.9%). Given that Randolph is still adding strength to his body, I expect his numbers to continue to improve for a few years. In contrast, Lee is likely to start to lose some of his athleticism over the next 2-3 years, potentially limiting his impact. Again, given the near identical numbers between the two, I see no great upgrade in Lee. The Warriors definitely need rebounding help, but trading for Lee simply swaps one good rebounder for another — resulting in nearly no net gain. The team’s rebounding woes had far more to do last year with injuries to Biedrins and Randolph and Nelson’s small-ball rotations than they did with available rebounding talent. Despite Lee’s impressive rebounding numbers, I’m not convinced a Lee/Biedrins/Udoh/Gadzuric rotation at 4/5 makes us a better rebounding team than Randolph/Biedrins/Turiaf/Udoh.

Lee is the beef the Warriors need — Not really. Just because Lee is stronger than Randolph, Wright and Udoh (but not Turiaf, who we would likely lose in the deal), doesn’t mean he’s strong enough to make a difference at either end of the court. His defense is famously poor against power players both big and small. He doesn’t have traditional back-to-the-basket moves, so he’s giving us nothing we need for half court sets. His interior offense comes mostly off put-backs and pick-and-rolls, just like our current power forward crop. Lee has excelled in the system most like Nelson’s in the NBA. For those looking for a player that can thrive outside of Nelson’s schemes, the Knicks are the last place we should be looking for help. Just because Lee looks like a bull in a china shop when he plays the Warriors doesn’t mean that’s how he’ll perform against the rest of the NBA. I’d be much more willing to give up Randolph if we were getting a power forward that has low post offensive moves and the strength to guard the other team’s go-to guy. Lee just isn’t that player.

Lee will help us win now — Does David Lee stop Pau Gasol, Tim Duncan, Paul Milsap, LeMarcus Aldridge, Blake Griffin, Luis Scola, David West or Zach Randolph? Does he provide great help defense to slow down Andrew Bynum, Yao Ming, Al Jefferson, Greg Oden, or DeMarcus Cousins? If not, he’s not going to be a player that helps the Warriors jump into playoff contention. Maybe he helps move us from 26 to 36 wins next year and the year after while he’s still in his prime, but that still leaves us 14 wins short of this year’s playoff threshold. And that’s without considering the drag losing key rotation guys like Turiaf or Azubuike — two of our better defenders — would have on the squad. Don Nelson and Larry Riley may want to scrape out every win possible from the early 2010-11 season — either to campaign for their jobs or restore a bit of their reputation — but whatever minor gain Lee would bring us now won’t be enough to turn the franchise into a serious playoff threat. Keeping and developing Randolph, on the other hand, gives the Warriors a high-ceiling player that — with admittedly significant risk — could end up being the type of superstar that elevates the team when allowed to grow with Curry. When you factor in Lee’s potentially $80 million long-term contract on the books — a contract that would keep the Warriors from having max or near-max money in 2011 or 2012 — the coming David Lee era looks a lot like the “not good enough to succeed, not bad enough to rebuild” era that we’ve endured for far too long. We’ve been down this round before; it was bumpy.

I fully admit that I may overrate Anthony Randolph’s potential in my reluctance to trade him, but there’s one overriding reason I don’t want to see the crumbling Cohan/Rowell/Riley/Nelson regime run him out of town in their (hopefully) final hours. More than any other player on the roster, Randolph has shown that he can be a dominant two-way player. He’s the only guy we have that can be a game-changer at both the offensive and defensive end of the court. Curry has also shown flashes of this with his improved late-season defense, as did Ellis when he wasn’t run ragged with 48-minute performances, but Randolph’s size and demeanor give him the best shot of controlling games at both ends of the court. We’ve lived for so long through the offense-only line-ups rolled out by Nelson that I worry we’ve forgotten what a complete player looks like, and just how significant his presence can be on the court. Randolph isn’t a complete player yet — but he has the best shot of anyone on the roster of growing into one. Warriors fans — not Knicks fans — should get the thrill of witnessing that development.

A good read....

Randolph is basically David Lee 7 years younger with better handles, shot blocking and more potential.

I love it. We know have 3 steals of the 2009 draft (Gallo, Randolph, Walker).

MIA has a weakness. All mythical creatures do.... Their achilles heal is the PAINT. Dominate the paint. Like owning the trenches in football. OWN THE PAINT, control the interior and you'll have a chance.

This is why I say pursue a PG, but also put the pedal to the metal and go grab one more BIG (Tyson Chandler, Omeka Okafor, Josh Powell, Johan Petro). Something like that. Unless you feel like you have a great shot at Carmelo or if you're sure Curry will return to some form in his contact year... It would be wise to move now while you can.

I love it. We know have 3 steals of the 2009 draft (Gallo, Randolph, Walker).

MIA has a weakness. All mythical creatures do.... Their achilles heal is the PAINT. Dominate the paint. Like owning the trenches in football. OWN THE PAINT, control the interior and you'll have a chance.

This is why I say pursue a PG, but also put the pedal to the metal and go grab one more BIG (Tyson Chandler, Omeka Okafor, Josh Powell, Johan Petro). Something like that. Unless you feel like you have a great shot at Carmelo or if you're sure Curry will return to some form in his contact year... It would be wise to move now while you can.

I'm sold on this too. Acquire the final piece to our absolute domination of the paint then take our time in acquiring a PG while sitting on Douglas in meantime.

Can you imagine STAT+Randolph+Tyrus+Turiaf with Jordan in the wings? The athletic, young, versatile power would be mind boggling.

Acquire a legit point to surround Walker/Douglas (Morrow???), with Gallo in the middle?

I love it. We know have 3 steals of the 2009 draft (Gallo, Randolph, Walker).

MIA has a weakness. All mythical creatures do.... Their achilles heal is the PAINT. Dominate the paint. Like owning the trenches in football. OWN THE PAINT, control the interior and you'll have a chance.

This is why I say pursue a PG, but also put the pedal to the metal and go grab one more BIG (Tyson Chandler, Omeka Okafor, Josh Powell, Johan Petro). Something like that. Unless you feel like you have a great shot at Carmelo or if you're sure Curry will return to some form in his contact year... It would be wise to move now while you can.

STAT led the league in points in the paint last season with 1,100+ so we practically gonna own the paint neither a scrub fill in C of theirs or Bosh can contain Amar'e that team is practically 3 stars and a lot of flaws

As soon as I heard we were getting Randolph, I was pumped. He's been suffocating under that retard, Don Nelson. He could become a real game changer on both ends of the floor. I'm hoping he'll have a breakout season under D'antoni.

Ok, the more I think about this trade, the more I stand in awe of how much of a highway robbery it truly was. We got three extremely useful players and one of them is a 20 year old freakish athelete with all-NBA potential. Randolph is so perfect for D'antoni's system, it's not even funny. I'm pumped.

Far far away from the orgy that consist of clyde, 8's, rady, smokes and rono

Posts

11,260

Rep Power

0

Originally Posted by keyser soze

Ok, the more I think about this trade, the more I stand in awe of how much of a highway robbery it truly was. We got three extremely useful players and one of them is a 20 year old freakish athelete with all-NBA potential. Randolph is so perfect for D'antoni's system, it's not even funny. I'm pumped.

Well said. He's extremely young and the first Knick born in the 90's to play NBA minutes for us...he can do many things on the court which makes him so special. Once he develops more awareness and intangibles, he'll be almost flwaless in his gym.

As soon as I heard we were getting Randolph, I was pumped. He's been suffocating under that retard, Don Nelson. He could become a real game changer on both ends of the floor. I'm hoping he'll have a breakout season under D'antoni.

I Wouldnt say that nelson is a retard.....

he just has alot of control over player signings and i firmly believe he holds talent back in order to lower the pay in which they request during their contract years.

I personally believed that he benched baron davis in that end of the year game to see who made the playoffs against the nuggets in order to lower there value.

same thing that he did to jamal crawford

and same thing he is doing to brandon wright as we speak

yes that is retarded but at the same time, its not for no reason or random, its calculated, he knows he doesnt have a championship level team and until he does he will continue to toy with the youth of golden state until a gem comes along he can ride the back of

The thing I love the most about our team, is we don't ever seem afraid

he just has alot of control over player signings and i firmly believe he holds talent back in order to lower the pay in which they request during their contract years.

I personally believed that he benched baron davis in that end of the year game to see who made the playoffs against the nuggets in order to lower there value.

same thing that he did to jamal crawford

and same thing he is doing to brandon wright as we speak

yes that is retarded but at the same time, its not for no reason or random, its calculated, he knows he doesnt have a championship level team and until he does he will continue to toy with the youth of golden state until a gem comes along he can ride the back of

I dunno, deliberately holding back the development of your own players is even more retarded than just being a bad coach and not knowing how to deal with playing time. How would he know if he found a "gem," if he rarely gives some of his young players time on the court.

I live in the Bay Area and I am a die hard knicks fan. I do however see the warriors play and one thing I can tell you is this. If I was gm, I would never trade Anthony Randolph for Lee. I love how Lee plays but I think he has hit his 'ceiling', Randolph however is a kid that has the potential to be an all star year after year. One thing that most Warrior fan will tell you is he cant play defense, but that is the opposite, everytime the bay area media refer to him is he is always associated with 'working hard to make himself better on the defensive end' ....Don Nelson basketball doesnt require defense and for some reason he trades players who plays D. Reason why we got Turiaf, Azubuke, and Randolph! they all play D.

Whenever the warriors play the lakers, Odom and Randolph matchups are ones to watch because Randolph do play well against Lamar. At one point Lamar was so annoyed and got a T because Randolph was outplaying him. Azubuke is not a Kobe stopper (who is) but he is the one who defends Kobe. Kelena CAN shoot as well.

Knicks fan you will love these 3 players. I am glad they were traded to the Knicks.

I dunno, deliberately holding back the development of your own players is even more retarded than just being a bad coach and not knowing how to deal with playing time. How would he know if he found a "gem," if he rarely gives some of his young players time on the court.

To be fair, D'antoni isn't known for playing his younger players either. Look how small of a bench the Suns played with when he coached there as compared to now.

That said, Nelson is an egomaniac who needs more attention than his players. Hes far far worse than Dantoni and will deliberately not play someone just because of his personal feelings against them. Brilliant Offensive mind, but pure poison to a team.

I wish Basketball would have more layered coaching like Football. A coach in charge of offense, and one in charge of defense. Closest to that was Celtics, but they needed an offensive mind.

Doc Rivers to control the players, Don Nelson drawing up offensive schemes, Thibodeau taking charge of defense. Would be awesome.